RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — Back in September, Attorney General Mark Herring rode along with the Richmond Ambulance Authority as they responded to overdose calls.

He told 8News about the experience.

“The stereotypical user that we might have thought might have been out there … if it were ever true, it is not true today,” Herring said.

Herring helped pass a law in 2015 letting first responders carry the overdose-reversing drug Naloxone.
Last year, the RAA administered nearly 400 doses of the drug.And making it available without a prescription.

“This is something that literally can affect any family and we all need to work together to turn it around,” Herring said.

Half of young people who used heroin got started by abusing prescription opioids.

One in fifteen individuals who misuse prescription opioid painkillers will try heroin within 10 years.

The number of opioid prescriptions has nearly tripled over the last 25 years, and the United States now accounts for nearly 100 percent of the world’s hydrocodone prescriptions and 81 percent for oxycodone.

The number of Americans abusing heroin nearly doubled from 2007 to 2012, with nearly 700,000 now abusing heroin.